Here's how to cook monkfish by chef Chantelle Nicholson from Tredwell's Restaurant.
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00:00Hi, I'm Chantelle Nicholson, Chef Patron of Treadwells in London, and today I'm going to
00:04be showing you how to cook monkfish. So we've got a beautiful monkfish tail which we're going
00:08to be serving with an anchovy aioli and some fresh asparagus. So here we have a monkfish
00:17tail that's been skinned and the head's been removed. I'm going to just take off a little
00:20bit of the membrane that's remaining and then slice it into tranches. So you just want to
00:26remove this membrane that you can see here, just with a sharp knife, just under the skin
00:34and along.
00:36So to cut through the bone you'll need a serrated knife. If you put the bone at the top of the
00:44fish it's much easier to cut through as well.
00:50Next we're going to salt the fish in rock salt for 10 minutes. This is going to serve
01:02a dual purpose by removing some of the moisture, because monkfish can be quite a wet fish, but
01:07also season it right the way through. Pop the monkfish in and pack it again with rock salt
01:16on top. Make sure you use this timer, 10 minutes maximum.
01:21So pop it in the fridge, 10 minutes later we can rinse it off.
01:35For the aioli we've got 3 egg yolks here. I'm going to grate 1 clove of garlic, we've also
01:40got some Dijon mustard, white wine vinegar and a touch of anchovy sauce for a bit of extra
01:46zing.
01:47So pop the mustard in, a dash of white wine vinegar, then we're going to whisk it to emulsify
02:02and add the oil. I generally tend to use a mix of slightly less intense olive oil, more
02:07like a pumice oil and just finish it with a little olive oil otherwise it can be a little
02:11bit bitter.
02:12If you're not a fan of making mayonnaise or aioli by hand you can use a stick blender and
02:15it works really well and a bit quicker.
02:17Once the eggs have gone a little bit pale and aerated we're going to add the oil really
02:21slowly to start with. Once it's starting to thicken you can add the oil a little bit quicker
02:24as well because it's already got the first emulsification has occurred.
02:30That's all of the pumice oil, we're just going to finish with a touch of olive oil to add a
02:37bit more richness.
02:45And the anchovy sauce.
02:48Because the anchovy is quite salty I'd suggest you taste it before you add any extra seasoning
02:56just to make sure it's not too overly salted. There we have our aioli. So the fish was salting
03:00for 10 minutes, we've just rinsed it off and patted it dry and now we're about to start
03:05cooking. So a really hot pan, nice foaming butter before we put the monkfish in.
03:08So start it off on a high heat and when it starts to colour just turn it down a little bit and if you need to cool it down even further just add a touch more butter which will bring the temperature right down.
03:13So when you've got a nice golden colour on the bottom of the monkfish, turn it over and cook the other side and we're going to baste the coloured side as well to give it more golden colour on it.
03:41So that's been in the pan, both sides, for about six to eight minutes.
03:44We're going to pop it in the oven, really hot oven, about 200 degrees,
03:47for about three to four minutes until it's cooked all the way through.
03:50So the monkfish has been in for another three minutes.
03:53To check and see if it's done, take a metal skewer,
03:56pop it down right beside the bone for a couple of seconds,
04:01pull it out, and if it's hot enough to touch, it's ready to go.
04:05I like to turn my monkfish on the bone because I feel it gives it a lot more flavour,
04:09but if you don't want it that way, just take it off.
04:15I'm just going to pop that on the plate.
04:19I'm just going to heat up some of the blanched asparagus I prepared earlier
04:23in that delicious monkfish butter.
04:32Pop that on the plate.
04:34And then a really large dollop of the anchovy aioli.
04:49And there we have it, the monkfish with asparagus and anchovy aioli.
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